Half-Life and Times

Wednesday, July 18, 2007

Mr. Voldemort in the dining room with a wand...

I'm not one of those folks that pores over the Leaky Cauldron or mugglenet boards trying to piece together clues about who's going to die (and who would be mortified if anyone actually told them) but I do have my theory. And I should warn you that the two characters I said were most likely to get it in Serenity were the ones that got it, so take that for what it's worth.

I'm betting that Rubeus Hagrid and Neville Longbottom don't survive the Deathly Hallows. I'm guessing that Neville manages to off Bellatrixie (if any of the kids can muster up enough hate to utter an Unforgivable Curse, he can) and then goes down to He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named before Harry finally morts Voldie. As for Hagrid, every other father figure Harry has had has died so I'm guessing Hagrid will bite it too. But I'm still not convinced that we won't see Dumbledore again before we're done.

So there - not spoilers because I have absolutely no way of knowing any of this but I figured it was only fair to throw my predictions out there to be scoffed at or wondered over a few days from now.

We're debating on whether to go ahead and buy two copies or just one. We didn't preorder any but we've never had any trouble picking up a Potter within 24 hours of release, so hopefully that will hold true again. Until we're both through, this will be a Potter-free zone...

Crispy

Grass isn't supposed to crunch when you walk across the lawn, is it? I know we've gotten a little rain in the past few days, but we're well into dormant when it comes to the fescue. And the tulip trees are already turning yellow and starting to lose leaves (that's not horribly unusual and they always seem to come out of it okay). But man...

Sunday, July 15, 2007

Good Stuff

Man, isn't that great! From the Nudie suits on the cover and the Led Zeppelin stomp of the title cut through the whole damn disk, there's not a weak cut on the whole dang thing. Frickin' awesome. And if you didn't think of Graham Chapman saying "Eeee! Ecky thump!" into a microphone when you saw that title, you clearly ain't hanging around the same people I am...

Second, "Psych" is back on the air with a new season. The funniest show on television that doesn't have either Jason Lee or Steve Carell as the lead. The opening ep with Tim Curry and Gina Gershon was one of the funniest things I've ever seen - who knew Gina Gershon could do comedy?

While we're talking about the USA Network, my favorite really new thing is "Burn Notice". Jeffrey Donovan is pretty good but the supporting characters (Bruce "Ash" Campbell, Sharon Gless andGabrielle Anwar) are what make the show. Check it out! Oh, and Bruce frickin' Campbell!!

Finally, we saw the latest Harry Potter movie last night and it's good! It's not Alfonso Cuaron Azkaban good, but it's good! It's nice to see the kids actually learning to act and Imelda Staunton's interpretation of Umbridge is spot on. I have my quibbles with it but overall it was a very good addition to the series - we'll need to see it again before it's gone.

The Pixelization of Darth Cheney

As you've probably heard by now, the Veep has apparently removed himself from the Executive Branch, causing many to opine that he seems to believe he belongs to a fourth branch of the government. You may have also heard that he's removed himself from the planet, convincing Google (and Microsoft to some extent) to pixelate the whole Naval Observatory circle, which included the residence of the Vice-President. You can see a screenshot above and below, you can see a little more clearly the difference between within and outside the circle.

I thought there might be another possibility, like maybe the Veep had managed to get a pixel camouflage net suspended above the circle to show up on the satellite imagery, but the photo below that I took from the National Cathedral would seem to indicate that 's not the case. Although I suppose he might in fact be responsible for the haze.

The idea, I guess, is that this is all in the name of security, but if you'll note the photo below, you'll see that the imagery of the fricking Pentagon is clear enough that you can just about read the nametags of the guys in the courtyard. So don't give me that crap.

I'm acting like this is all funny and certainly Jon Stewart's "You Don't Know Dick" segments on The Daily Show have been hilarious, but if you step back, this is really scary shit. This goes far beyond the man having committed offenses that are likely impeachable - this gets into an area where I'd suggest a padded room and heavy medication would not be out of line. We know there are terrorists out there and we know they're out to get "us", but somehow I can't imagine that they are targeting the Vice-President in particular, who has done more to help their recruiting drives the last six years than any Osama bin Laden videotape ever could. The guy clearly needs professional help.